


Time Heals All Wounds

by indiefic



Category: Agent Carter (TV), Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Older Man/Younger Woman, Older Steve/Younger Peggy, Steggytime's Day, Steve Rogers is sent back to 1943, steggy babies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-11
Updated: 2016-02-16
Packaged: 2018-05-19 18:15:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5976502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/indiefic/pseuds/indiefic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The story spans the time period from 1943 to 1953, but references the entire MCU timeline (at least through AoU and the first half of Agent Carter, S2).  </p><p>Several years post AoU (it's surely AU after that) Steve Rogers is sent back to 1943.</p><p>"The smallest change could have enormous impact."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Italy**

**October 1943**

 

When Steve woke, there was no way for him to determine how long he’d been out.  Quite literally, no time had passed.  In fact, it had reversed.  More than eighty years.

 

He was so disoriented at first, only dimly aware that he was in a prison camp.  He didn’t even resist as they herded him, and several dozen other prisoners, onto trucks and shipped them to a Hydra base.  It took Steve a while to work out  _ who _ he was, then  _ where  _ he was, and finally  _ when _ he was.  

 

No one.  Late 1943.  Italy.

 

Steve wasn’t exactly no one.  As far as he could tell, he still looked the same as he had in recent memory.  Older, more broken down than his contemporary in this time, but largely the same.  He hadn’t shaved in weeks and his hair was longer than it had ever been.  But as for who he really was in this war, he had no idea.  He certainly wasn’t a young man, recently given a new lease on life by Erskine’s formula.  

 

For so long, all Steve had wanted was to have another chance to live the life he was meant to live.  Steve never would have thought he was one who was prone to nostalgia or sentiment.  But somehow, he’d fallen victim.  Because war torn Europe in 1943 was somehow darker than he remembered.  More grim.  More real.

 

Less like home than he would have expected.

 

Steve had read the work of Edward Lorenz.  After the Avengers could no longer deny the fact that the time gem was real.  Steve studied up, in the hopes that it would give him insight, strategy.  All he felt he learned was that everything was ultimately unknowable.

 

Lorenz posited that something as insignificant as a butterfly flapping its wings could create a devastating storm halfway around the world.  The smallest changes could have greatly amplified effects.  It was true of most things, but seemed particularly salient when dealing with time, alternate futures, alternate pasts.  He’d glimpsed some of the alternate realms Wanda could access.

 

The smallest change could have enormous impact.  

 

Steve knew the danger in getting what you wished for.  He knew how terribly awry the best of intentions could go.  Any action Steve took in  _ this _ time,  _ this _ place, could change the events of history.  As problematic as the future was, if Steve took action, his interference could be damning humanity to something far worse.

 

Those thoughts rang in his mind, as he surveyed the horrors of the Hydra prison camp.  They kept him quiet, kept him hiding among the other prisoners of war.  Waiting.  Watching.  Trying to figure out if this was indeed the world he remembered, or some new hellish existence.

 

He wasn’t certain.  Not until he caught sight of himself, his younger self, in the dancing monkey shirt, with that ridiculous shield.  He watched, dumbstruck, as his younger self questioned the prisoners about Bucky.  He watched his younger self bolt to Bucky’s rescue, mindless of the danger, invincible and unafraid, as only the truly young could be.

 

Even knowing how it would all play out, Steve was still on edge the entire firefight.  He pitched in.  He helped the prisoners to safety.  But he didn’t fight, not the way Captain America fought.  This wasn’t his fight.  He stayed in the shadows.  

 

It was doubtful that anyone would look at him, thinner, older, with a heavy beard and bum hand, and realize he was a double for the man who was leading the charge.  But Steve gave no one any reason to question.  He stayed to the back.  He helped the wounded.

 

The march was arduous and they lost so many men.  Had he ever known that?  He remembered being so fiercely glad that Bucky was alive, so profoundly grateful that they’d saved as many men as they had.  He’d been equal parts enamored with and afraid of his newfound abilities.  But had he ever known how many they lost along the way?  

 

When they finally made it to camp, he watched his younger self get his glory.  He watched Phillips’ grudging respect.  He watched Peggy, saw the look she gave the brave young soldier, barely more than a boy.  Older and infinitely wiser, Steve now had no trouble reading her look for the invitation it was.  Too bad his younger self was too stupid to realize.  Of all of Steve’s regrets, that missed opportunity was the biggest.

  
  


* * *

 

It was depressingly easy for Steve to cobble together a new identity from the scattered pieces of so many broken men.  He took dog tags off a dead man, assumed his life.  No one questioned.  Because Steve belonged there.  He knew how to be a soldier in this war.  And, to his own disappointment, his time spent in the twenty-first century did quite a bit toward honing his skills of subterfuge.  Mostly it was easy to lie because he didn’t feel guilty about it.  Dead men didn’t care.  He knew that much with absolute certainty.

 

So Steve was a soldier.  Not Captain America.  Just a soldier.  He fought next to men, laid down his life for theirs and they did the same in return.  But he never quite managed to feel like part of the team.  

 

It seemed even being back in his own time, in his own place, couldn’t make him feel like he belonged.  He was as much a man out of time now as he had been when he woke up in Fury’s recovery room.  And everybody was so goddamn young.

 

Knowing the outcome of every skirmish, every battle, made some things easier, some things harder.  He wanted to go to Phillips, to lay it all out, to give him the information to save as many lives as possible.  But Steve had no idea what folly his interference might bring.  No gift, even one as dubious as his re-emergence in his own time, came without a price.  He knew that well.  And he wasn’t willing to let Phillips, or Peggy, or Bucky pay that price.

 

He had no idea what actions were safe to take.  So he kept quiet and kept his head down.

 

But he watched.  He always watched.

 

Peggy, as he’d already known, spent most of her time in London.  He was grateful for that, grateful that she wasn’t on the front lines, even if he knew she wanted to be.  Bucky, as always, was at his younger self’s side, looking far more haunted than Steve remembered.  Maybe Steve hadn’t been damaged enough himself at that point to recognize it in Bucky.  

 

He recognized it now.

 

It was difficult to be so close, to watch himself and the people he loved.  So he volunteered for assignments farther and farther afield.  His grand plan for avoiding familiar faces was shot to hell when he found himself part of a battalion trapped behind the German line outside Volgograd in early 1945.  He remembered this battle.  He knew his younger self was going to fight his way through the Hydra blockade and rescue more than a thousand men, himself included apparently.  

 

Somewhere among Steve’s fellow soldiers was Peggy’s future husband.  Steve tried hard not to scan the faces.  Not that he knew what Peggy’s husband looked like.  Steve had never seen a picture of the man.  Steve avoided asking Peggy any questions about him, and she had never offered information.  But the knowledge that her future husband was here, somewhere, still ate at Steve.

 

* * *

 

Steve wondered, after a while, if he wasn’t stuck in some new hell where he was destined to bear witness to all the horrors of his past without ever taking action.  He didn’t want to disturb things, didn’t want to alter  _ the way things were supposed to go _ .  

 

But the longer it went on, the more he asked himself if it really was the way things were  _ supposed to go _ , or just  _ the way they had gone _ .  

 

Was there value in repeating the past, if it was full of horror?  Was he dooming the future by taking action?  Or could he spare some future heartache?

 

He didn’t know.  He didn’t have a fucking clue.  But as he stood in the deep shadows, across the street from the bombed out pub and watched Peggy try to console his younger self, he wondered.

 

Steve Rogers could have taken Peggy Carter home that night.  They could have had at least one night together.  If he’d been smart enough to realize her comfort for what it was.  If he’d been brave enough to risk it all.  

 

But he hadn’t.  And so his younger self wouldn't.  Steve already knew that, as he stood there watching.  Steve and Peggy would both go home alone.  And next week, she’d give him their first and only kiss before he jumped aboard the Valkyrie.  

 

And that would be it.

 

* * *

 

But  _ that _ wasn’t it.  

 

And Steve hadn’t realized.  Even as jaded and bitter as he felt he was becoming, he hadn’t realized that the crash of the Valkyrie wasn’t the end of it.  Oh, it had been the end of things  _ for him. _  For a good seventy years, his younger self was done.

 

But Peggy wasn’t done.  Peggy was still here.  And Peggy was lost in a way that nearly brought Steve to his knees.  Because she didn’t visibly react.  At all.  But Steve knew.  He had hindsight - foresight? - that no one else had.  He’d seen the interviews, made decades after the fact.  He’d spoken with Peggy herself.  And he knew that beneath her impeccable facade, she was crushed, and alone, and unable and unwilling to admit it, for fear of truly falling to pieces.

 

He was shocked, and then irritated that he was shocked, when he stood outside her apartment watching, two weeks after the crash, and he saw her push through the door and out onto the sidewalk, dressed to the nines.  He followed her, thinking maybe she was meeting the fellas for a wake, a memorial.  But she didn’t go to any of the usual haunts.  

 

She went somewhere he’d never been, somewhere he’d never seen her go.  A club, crowded and dim.  He watched her take a seat at the bar, realizing she was already flying high.  Her laughter sounded forced, pitched too shrill.

 

Steve understood.  He did.  Too well.  Peggy was lonely and sad and she needed to forget.  He’d felt the same way many times.  And she was so damn young.  He couldn’t believe how young she seemed.  With the weight of the world on her shoulders.

 

By contrast, he felt about a thousand years old.  He’d aged, what?  Fifteen years since he last saw her like this, since he kissed her.  He’d been alive for another seventy beyond that.  He felt every second of it.  At this point, he wasn’t even sure if she would recognize him as the man she knew.  It was both a tempting and frightening thought.

 

So Steve, older, if not wiser, found a table in the corner and ordered a drink.  He watched Peggy flirt and dance.  He watched her brittle smile and her sad eyes.

 

He watched men, who did not value her, ply her with drinks and empty words.  He watched them touch her too casually.  And he watched her lean into the contact without seeming to actually enjoy it.

 

The final straw was the bet.  He’d seen the table of British soldiers, overheard their wager.  When the dashing young lieutenant pressed in close to Peggy, Steve couldn’t keep his distance any longer.  He tapped the guy on the shoulder and when he turned to look, Steve motioned for him to get lost.  

 

“Take a hike, son,” he said.  “She’s with me.”

 

The lieutenant wasn’t a big guy and maybe he saw something in Steve’s expression, but either way, he didn’t argue.  He left quietly.  

 

Taking a deep breath, Steve looked down at Peggy, who was blinking at him.  He gave her a tight smile, knowing this was dangerous.  “Care to dance?” he asked, sounding far more calm and collected than he would have thought possible.

 

She continued to stare at him mutely, and his fear that she might not recognize him was burning away.  He placed a hand at her waist and guided her to the dance floor, pulling her close.  Too close if she believed him to be a stranger, and not nearly close enough if she understood.  

 

She was incredibly intoxicated, wobbly on her feet and having trouble focusing on him.  She placed her hands on his upper arms, staring up at him.  She gave her head a little shake.  “H-How?”

 

He looked down at her, pursing his lips together, pulling her just a little closer.  She knew.  He knew she would, but it was still gratifying.  “I’m not here,” he said.  He stared into her eyes, shaking his head.  “I’m not him.”

 

She frowned, her brow puckering.  “What on earth do you mean you’re not him?  You’re clearly Ste-”

 

He leaned down, kissing her, long and deep, with teeth and tongue.  The way he’d always wanted to.  And she responded the way he knew she would, matching him in every way.  She melted into him, her fingers biting deeply into the muscles of his arms as she pushed up on tiptoe, demanding and full of surrender.

 

He finally broke off the kiss and pressed his forehead to hers.  “I know it’s confusing,” he said quietly, “but I’m not him.”

 

She pulled back and frowned again and her eyes were glassy. “Is he you?” she asked.

 

He opened his mouth and then closed it again, thrown by the question.  “Not yet,” he said.  It was the only answer he had.

 

* * *

 

He walked her home, his jacket around her shoulders, her hand tucked in the crook of his elbow, feeling lighter than he thought possible.  She teetered, leaning heavily into him as they walked.  The amount of blind trust she put in him was humbling.  He wanted nothing more than to keep her safe, for as long as she would let him.

 

When they reached her flat, he scooped her into his arms, carrying her up the stairs.  She made a contented sound and rested her head on his shoulder.  By the time he unlocked the door to her flat, she was asleep.

 

He made her as comfortable as he could on her little, threadbare sofa.  He left the jacket.  It was stupid.  He had no idea how much she might remember.  It would have been better if he took all traces with him.  But looking at her, sleeping peacefully, he couldn’t do it.

 

He kissed her gently on the cheek and let himself out.

 

END CHAPTER


	2. Chapter 2

**New York**

**November 1946**

 

Her ghost.  

 

That was what she took to calling him in her head.  She used to think it fondly.  These days it was a pejorative.  He couldn’t seem to decide if he intended to haunt her properly, or merely flit along the periphery, leaving a wake that would invariably throw her entire life into disarray.

 

For a while, she thought she created him, willed him into existence.  That night was still hazy, unreal, shrouded in so much sorrow.  But she had the jacket.  And it smelled like him.  She remembered the feel of his lips against hers, the solidness of his shoulder beneath her head as he carried her inside.  She remembered feeling cherished, appreciated.

 

She didn’t know how he’d made his way back after the crash, how he survived.  She didn’t know why he hadn’t told anyone, or why he looked so different.  Howard spent months combing the arctic looking for him and Peggy hadn’t had the heart to tell him it was futility, because Steve Rogers was already home.  She was rather afraid they’d put her in a straightjacket.  She had no proof he was back, other than her alcohol tinged memories and a jacket she could have gotten anywhere.

 

She knew it would be best to let his memory go.  To move on with her life.  But with things the way they were, she couldn’t even mourn him properly, couldn’t be done with him.  Not that she particularly wanted to be done with him.  What she wanted was to pull him close, and keep him there.  But he was ever elusive, her ghost.  Her Steve.  Always  _ just _ out of sight.  Forever out of reach.

 

Peggy was tired of being alone, tired of her grief.  She felt poisoned by it.  Ghost or no ghost, she intended to make a change.  She couldn’t stand on the sidelines, watching her life pass her by.  She had a chance, and she was going to take it.

 

One final time, she checked her hair in the mirror, then grabbed her clutch and headed for the door.  It wasn’t a date.  The entire office would be there, a send off party to congratulate Chief Sousa on his promotion.  But Peggy intended to make it a memorable evening.

 

Everyone was in high spirits, Jack most of all, which irritated Peggy to no end.  He’d never admit it, but he clearly viewed Daniel as a rival, an obstacle.  Peggy knew he’d orchestrated the promotion to get Daniel out of the way.

 

Daniel, himself, seemed a bit melancholy.  Clearly, he was happy to be promoted.  But it was a bit of a white elephant, being sent all the way to Los Angeles with a skeleton crew, tasked with the impossible.  Though Peggy had faith in Daniel.  He was made of sterner stuff than most people realized.

 

For months she and Daniel had tiptoed around one another.  But now that he was headed to a new office, it made things both easier and harder.  They could pursue a relationship now.  But it would be, by necessity, long distance.  Still better than a ghost, Peggy told herself.  Though she was fairly certain she didn’t believe it.

 

At the party, Daniel was happy to see her.  She gave him a hug and he held her just a bit too tightly.  Her kiss against his cheek lingered longer than was strictly necessary.  As the night wore on, he touched her casually, and leaned in closer than required when speaking to her over the din in the back room at The Ale House.

 

On the way back from the loo, Peggy stopped at the bar, reasoning that it would be quicker than waiting on the waitress in the back room.  As she was waiting for her whisky, she glanced up into the mirror behind the bar and saw him.  

 

Her ghost, in the flesh.  Close enough to touch.

 

Sighing, she looked at the scarred bartop and shook her head.  Over the last couple of years, she’d caught sight of him across a crowded train, or standing on the sidewalk, just as her bus pulled away.  She never got a good enough look to be certain it was him. And she had never been able to run him to ground.  Not until now.  Clearly, he meant to be caught.

 

He slid into the barstool next to where she stood, waiting on her drink.  He was too thin and still had a beard.  His hair was clipped ruthlessly short.  He wore civilian clothes.  And he looked so weary.  

 

“I don’t think I can do this,” she said.

 

He leaned forward, bracing his arms against the bar, mug of beer cupped between his hands.  “Do what?”

 

Her temper flared and her breath came short.  “I can’t keep allowing my life to be uprooted any time you see fit to creep out of the shadows.”

 

He was quiet.  She watched him take a drink of his beer.  “No one is asking you to uproot your life.”

 

“Oh really?” she demanded.  “Then what is this, exactly?”  She turned and looked at him, but he was still staring at the mirror behind the bar.  “You keep your distance until you get bored and then you come just close enough to burn whatever progress I’ve made to ash.”

 

He tucked his chin, staring blindly at the bartop.  “That’s not what I’m doing.”

 

She glowered at him.  “Have you been watching me tonight?”

 

She could see the muscles in his jaw tighten.  “I need to make sure you’re safe.”

 

“Safe with Daniel?” she demanded.

 

He finally looked over at her.  He took a drink of his beer.  “No,” he said quietly, petulantly.  “That’s not what I want.”

 

She sighed, knowing how much it cost him to admit that.  She walked around him and took a seat on the barstool next to him.  “If you want me, dammit, Steve, then do something about it,” she said.  “But quit bloody haunting me.”

 

He stared at her, lips pursed tightly together.

 

She sighed, thanking the bartender as he set the whisky in front of her and left.  She looked at her glass.  “I’m lonely,” she said quietly, blinking back tears.  “And I miss you.  So much.  But I can't wait forever.”

 

He was quiet.  He took another sip of his beer.

 

She turned and looked at him, frowning.  “Why do you look so different?” she asked.  When he didn’t answer, she shook her head in irritation.  “How do you find me?  Do you follow me?”

 

He nodded reluctantly. “Yes.”   

 

She laughed mirthlessly, shaking her head, frustration warring with flattery.  “For how long?” 

 

He paused then, and she knew that guilty look well.  “Four years?” he said it like a question though she knew it wasn’t.

 

Peggy stared mutely at him.  That made absolutely no sense.  “ _ How _ ?”  

 

He sat there, as emotive as a statue.  

 

“You’re ...  _ changed _ ,” she said carefully.  Her gaze lighted on his left hand, which clearly had been badly mangled and showed no signs of healing.  She wasn’t sure if he could really use it at all.  That, in itself, shouldn’t have been possible.  Steve could heal from damn near anything.  He looked older too.  Though Peggy knew from experience that war could age a person far beyond their years.

 

He gave her a small nod.   “A lot has happened.”

 

She shook her head, frustration obvious.  “ _ How  _ has a lot happened, Steve?  How?  You’ve been officially missing for two years.  Not ten.  How were you injured?  Why won’t it heal?” 

 

He frowned.  “I can’t say,” he said with obvious regret.

 

“Where have you been?” she asked, her voice quiet and uneven.  “Can you at least tell me that?”

 

He looked at her then and the pain in his features was nearly unbearable.  It tore at her heart.  He looked so tired, so worn, frayed at the edges, and dead on his feet.  “War,” he said.  

 

Without thinking, she reached out, cupping his face in her hands.  “How many wars, my darling?” 

 

He blinked quickly, turning his face into her palm, only for a moment.  He pulled back, shaking his head.  “A lot of them,” he said, his voice low and rough.  “No one can know I’m here, Peg,” he said.  “No one.”

 

She shook her head, frustrated.  “Tell me,” she said.  “Tell me and I can help you.  If someone is after you, we can fix it.”

 

He winced.  “It’s not like that.  I know you want to help, but this is so far beyond you, beyond me.  I’m not supposed to be here.”

 

She canted her head to the side, looking at him, frowning.  “Did the Soviets find you after the crash?”

 

He reached out, taking both her hands in his one good one, squeezing them lightly.  “You can’t save me, Peg,” he said.  He gave her a sad smile.  “You  _ already _ saved me.  More than you can ever know.”  He took a deep breath.  “I can’t see you again.  It’s too dangerous.  Just know -  know that I’m all right.  And I want you to be safe.”

 

She laughed mirthlessly, wiping impatiently at the tear rolling down her cheek.  “So that’s it,” she said bitterly.  “You’re off again, after uprooting my life.  I get no answers, no resolution.  No nothing.  Except heartache.  Do you enjoy hurting me?”

 

He did look remorseful then, truly sad.  “Peg, I never intended - “

 

“I don’t give a damn what you intend, Steve,” she snapped.  “This is what happens with you.”  She shook her head.  “I’m done.  I’m done with this, with you.  I want you, but you clearly don’t share the sentiment, so I’m moving on with my life.  I’m going to give it a shot with Daniel.  He’s a good man.  I think maybe we have a chance.”

 

He stared at her and she could see the war waging inside him.  He didn’t like the idea of her with Daniel, whether he could admit it to himself or not.

 

Shaking her head, she threw back her whisky in one shot and stood up.  She’d gotten a whole step in before he grabbed her elbow and pulled her back to him.  She twisted around and kissed him hard, biting down on his bottom lip, her nails scratching against his scalp.  She thought it might shock him, but his reaction was instantaneous.  He pulled her tightly against his body, kissing her back with obvious hunger.

 

He broke off the kiss, breathing hard.  “Not here.”

 

He pulled her behind the bar and through the door into the kitchen, then outside, and into the alley.  She shoved him against the rough brick wall and kissed him again.  

 

He gentled then, pulling her close, holding her tenderly.  And she was crying.

 

* * *

 

Steve didn’t even have an apartment, just a depressing little motel room, but Peggy didn’t care.  She hadn’t exactly led a chaste life and she thought she was fairly well versed.  She thought she knew what to expect.  But none of her partners had ever treated her like this, with such obvious care, bordering on reverence.

 

She expected him to be shy, hesitant.  He was neither.  He was sure, and a little sad, but his resolve matched her own.  And she knew.  This wasn’t the boy she kissed in the back of Schmidt’s car two years ago.  She didn’t know how that was possible, but it was.  This was a man, hardened and scarred.  A man who had lived a life filled with bitter regret and soured dreams.  

 

She felt overwhelmed, by the way he touched her, by the depth of how much she had missed him.  Her fingers traced over his skin, finding the uneven ridges of scars.  What wars had he found where there were weapons that could scar him?  Where had he been?

 

He had taken lovers.  That much was obvious.  Had it been before the crash?  After?  She had no idea if any actual love had been involved in those encounters.  She hoped there was some, for his sake.  Even if the thought of him with someone else made her viciously jealous.  He seemed starved for contact and affection and, most of all,  _ her _ .  The right partner.

 

As a lover, Steve was considerate and devoted.  Inventive as well, and surprisingly without shame.  He gave and took freely and without restraint.  Somehow, she knew that with her, he was more vulnerable than he had ever allowed himself to be.  And she did not take that for granted.  She pulled him close and held him tight.  She would keep him safe, for as long as he allowed it.

 

The sky was lightening with dawn and they lay together on the narrow little bed.  Her head was pillowed on his chest, her fingernails tracing idly across his skin.  It felt perfect.  And fleeting.  “You’re going to disappear again, aren’t you?” she asked.

 

He was silent for a long time and he finally shifted, urging her to roll away, onto her side so he could wrap himself around her.  He pulled her back against him, his arm tight around her hips.  “If I had explanations, I would give them to you,” he said quietly.  “But I don’t.  I don’t know how I’m here, or why.  But I know that I’m not  _ supposed _ to be here.”

 

“Here in New York?  Here in bed with me?” she asked, frustrated.  “What do you mean?”

 

“Any of it,” he replied wearily.  “I’m afraid that being with you is going to change things, to inadvertently put you in danger.”  He sighed.  “I need to stay away from you.  But I can’t.  I’m not that strong.”

 

She rolled over in his embrace, looking at him.  He was frowning.  She rested her hand against his cheek.  “What we have is never going to hurt me.”

 

His frown intensified.  “You don’t know that.”

 

She shook her head.  “Were you exposed to a toxin?  Is this some concern about Erskine’s formula?”

 

“Nothing like that,” he said with a sigh.

 

“Then  _ what _ ?”

 

He just looked at her and she growled in frustration, pushing away from him far enough to lay on her back.  “I swear to God, if you leave me again after this I will hunt you down and end you.  You know I can do it.”

 

She glanced over at him and he looked at her, his lips pressing together as he fought to contain a smile.  He seemed so much older in that moment, world weary.  Like she was the naive one.  It was an uncomfortable role reversal.  

 

“I can’t be with you the way you deserve, Peggy,” he said.  “But I’m yours if you want me.  I’ve always been yours.”

 

“I do want you,” she said quietly. “So very much.”

 

He leaned over and kissed her gently.  “I love you, Peggy Carter.  I always have.”  

 

END CHAPTER


	3. Chapter 3

**New York**

**February 1947**

 

Steve jerked awake with a start, his heart pounding in his chest.  Peggy’s hand was immediately on his shoulder, pulling him back.  He took a deep breath and gathered her close, relishing the feel of her cuddling against him.  She wasn’t really awake, he knew.  But even mostly asleep, she still offered him comfort.  He kissed the top of her head.

 

He didn’t deserve this.  He knew that.  He felt like an impostor, a thief.  And yet, he couldn’t walk away.  He couldn’t leave her, even if he knew that would be in her best interest.  For year after year, Steve had shelved his own desires, deferring in the name of the greater good.  

 

In this time, Steve had no idea what the greater good really was.  Was it saving Bucky from Hydra?  Decades earlier than slated?  Or would that make things worse?  Steve didn’t have any resources to support Bucky.  He didn’t have an army to fight Hydra and the Soviets.  He couldn’t explain to anyone how he possessed the knowledge.  He had no idea who to trust.

 

Steve was more than a little afraid that saving Bucky would simply mean turning him over to different handlers, every bit as corrupt as the ones he had now.  And while Steve was more than willing to risk his own life to save Bucky, he wasn’t willing to risk Peggy’s.  Not for anything.

  
  


* * *

 

“So, Marge, you decided not to come out with the boys again last night,” Jack said, clearly fishing.  “It’s bad for morale.”

 

Peggy met his gaze evenly.  “I was feeling poorly.  I had an early evening.”

 

Jack nodded, clearly unconvinced.  “Those are, uh, some nice bruises you have there by your collarbone.”  Peggy balled her hand into a fist to keep from reaching for the love bites.  She’d tried to cover them, but to no avail.  Jack smiled broadly.  “Well, the boys were disappointed, but I’m sure they’ll get over it, seeing as how you were feeling under the weather.  Or under something, anyway.”

 

Peggy’s teeth ground together and she gathered up her things, heading for the door.  She walked to the subway station, contemplating her situation.  She wasn’t exactly sure what she had with Steve.  It certainly wasn’t the kind of relationship she’d dreamed of as a young woman.  But everything she lost in the war taught her to be grateful for what she had.  She waited for the right partner and Steve was it.  That fact alone made up for the less than ideal circumstances.

 

Peggy didn’t miss going on dates.  Especially not when the alternative was being curled up at home on the sofa or in the bed with Steve.  No one, in a very long time, had cared for her the way he did, embracing every part of her, good and bad.  He didn’t judge.  He didn’t hold her to unattainable standards.  He accepted her faults and applauded her strengths.  

 

But he wasn’t truly hers.  Not the way she wanted him to be.

 

For as much as she knew him - and she did know him - so many of his circumstances were still a mystery.  He would disappear for days, a week, two weeks.  He gave her as much warning as he could, as much information as he thought was safe.  

 

She finally managed to wheedle out of him that he was in Minsk last month.  Why the hell was he in Minsk?  She had no idea what he was doing, who he was meeting, what he was searching for.  It was clear he was searching, watching.  But she suspected that even if he found his target, he would be forbidden from intervening.  By who or what, she had no idea.

 

When Peggy reached the apartment, Steve was there, asleep on the bed, face down in the pillow, sprawled out like a starfish.  He’d arrived home late the previous afternoon, and kept her up for most of the night.  She wasn’t surprised he needed sleep.  She’d been dead on her feet for most of the day.

 

It amused her how Steve didn’t seem to have a concept of a natural circadian rhythm.  He didn’t sleep much, but when he did get tired, he would sleep regardless of the time.  She would find it more heartwarming if she didn’t suspect it was a side effect of having spent far too many days on a battlefield.  It was a coping mechanism, like everything else.

 

She shrugged out of her coat and kicked off her heels, sitting down on the bed.  She reached out and raked her hand through his hair, starting at the base of his skull and moving up.  He sucked in a deep breath, his knees curling up toward his chest, pushing his head back into her hand.  The late afternoon light filtered through the window, glinting off his hair and she could see a handful of gray hairs, mixed with the blond.  She shook her head. 

 

“How old are you?” she asked, laying down on the bed, curling around his larger form.

 

“Hell if I know,” he mumbled, clearly still half asleep.  He took a deep breath and then let out a little snore.

 

She carded her fingers through his hair again.  “You have some gray hairs,” she offered helpfully.

 

“Named Peg ‘n Buck,” he muttered.

 

She stared at the back of his head and then pushed herself into a sitting position, frowning at him.  He’d get like this sometimes, so tired, disoriented that he said things that didn’t make sense.  It didn’t happen often, but it never failed to scare her.  “Steve,” she said carefully, “Bucky’s dead.”

 

He mumbled, shifting, burrowing deeper into the pillow.  “S’not,” he said.  He mumbled again and she could make out the term “red room.”

 

She sighed, looking down at him.  It was unfair, she knew.  But she also knew an opening when she saw one.  “Steve, how did you manage to walk away from the Valkyrie’s crash?”

 

He made a grouchy noise, irritated that she was still talking to him, not letting him sleep.  “Didn’t,” he mumbled.

 

She canted her head to the side, looking at him.  “What do you mean you didn’t?” she asked.  He let out another snore.  She shook his shoulder.  “Steve, how did you survive the crash?  Who found you?  When did they find you?”

 

He ground his teeth together audibly, murmuring.  “Fury,” he said.

 

Fury?  Who, or what was fury?  She shook his shoulder again.  “When, Steve?”

 

He sighed, finally grabbing another pillow and jamming it over his head.  “Seventy years.”  His body went slack again and he was snoring.

 

Peggy climbed on top of him, rolling him over onto his back as she ripped away the pillow.  “ _ Steve _ ,” she snapped.

 

He blinked up at her, finally focusing on her face.  He took a deep breath and looked up at her expectantly.  “ _What_?”

 

“What do you mean you didn’t walk away from the Valkyrie, and what does seventy years have to do with it?” she demanded.  “And what the hell is fury?”

 

He looked at her, his expression slowly closing in on itself.  He looked away, screwing his eyes shut.  “ _ Damn _ .”

 

Peggy was still sitting on him, straddling on him.  She crossed her arms over her chest, glaring down at him.  “Tell me.   _ Now. _ ”

 

He turned back to her, meeting her gaze, his mouth a grim line.  “I didn’t walk away from the crash,” he said quietly.  “I will be found, by the organization that will eventually supplant the SSR.  It will be headed by a man by the name of Fury.”

 

“ _ Will be found _ ,” she repeated, confused and scared.  “In the future?” she scoffed, trying very hard to keep her voice even.

 

He nodded soberly.  “About seventy years from now,” he said.  He sighed, rubbing his good hand roughly over his face.  He looked up at her warily.  “They defrosted me.  Used me to fight their wars.  I was there ... for a long time.  And then I was sent back.  I don’t know how. To 1943.”

 

She shook her head.  “That makes no sense.  That’s _ insane _ .”

 

“I am well aware of that fact,” Steve said.

 

Peggy frowned, trying to wrap her mind around what he’d told her.  He didn’t walk away from the crash.  The Valkyrie went down in the arctic and it would stay there until someone by the name of Fury -  

 

She stopped, her heart pounding in her chest as she looked down at him.  “If what you say is true, if you didn’t walk away from the crash then - “

 

He closed his eyes again, wincing.  He looked up at her.  “Your Steve is still out there.  Waiting.  Sleeping.”

 

Horror shot through her.  She pushed off him, stumbling away from the bed.  She ran to the bureau, yanked open the little drawer and pulled out her pistol.  She turned back, expecting him to be giving chase, but he just lay there, on the bed, watching her.

 

She pointed the gun at him.  “Who are you?”

 

He sighed.  “I’m exactly who I said I am,” he replied calmly, sadly.  “I’m Steve Rogers.”

 

“According to you,” she spat, hating the way her hand shook, “Steve Rogers is still in the arctic somewhere.”

 

He nodded.  “Both of those statements are true.”  He held up his hands in surrender and slowly sat up in bed, throwing his legs over the side, watching her.  He sighed.  “You’ve known this, Peggy.  You’ve known I’m not that boy you kissed in the back of Schmidt’s car.  You’ve said it yourself many times.  I’ve changed.  I’m -  _ fuck,  _ I don’t know.  I’ve got to be fortysomething physically by now.”

 

“Where is Steve?” she demanded.  Her head was filled with images of him, trapped inside the wreckage of the Valkyrie in subzero temperatures.  Freezing.  Alone.  Forgotten.  Because she stopped looking.

 

He shook his head, and remained silent.

 

“Tell me!” she yelled, hating the way her voice screeched.

 

“I can’t,” he said.  He looked truly remorseful.  “I can’t.”

 

She advanced on him, gun still pointed at him, dead center.  “You  _ will _ tell me.”

 

He looked up at her sadly.  He shook his head.  “I can’t, Peggy,” he said.  “That Steve Rogers has to sleep.  For decades.  It’s his lot.”

 

“He’s out there,” she said in a strangled whisper.  “Alone.”

 

He nodded.  “I know,” he said quietly, hanging his head.  “I lived it.”

 

“Just tell me where he is,” she pled, tears streaming down her face.  “Let me save him.   _ Please _ .”

 

He looked at her and his expression was agony, but he shook his head.  “He has a very important role to play in the future.  I can’t tell you where he is.”

 

“You mean you won’t,” she snapped.  

 

He nodded, meeting her gaze.  “You’re right,” he said.  “I won’t.”

 

She yelled, inarticulate and full of rage, swinging at him with the butt of the pistol.  She clipped him in the temple, sending him toppling back on the bed, clutching his head.  She tucked the gun into her pocket and went after him, hitting him as hard as she could.  She knew it was futility, but she didn’t care.  She’d never been as angry as she was in that moment.  It was like she was losing Steve all over again, but now all that emotion had an outlet.

 

She hit him until her hands ached from the impact.  He didn’t fight back.  He didn’t even try particularly hard to defend himself.  He let her rage until she exhausted herself, collapsing onto the bed next to him, sobbing.

 

She didn’t linger.  She pushed herself off the bed, wiping at her tears.  “Out,” she spat.  “I want you out.  Now.  And don’t come back.”

 

He nodded and pushed himself up off the bed.  He took several items out of the dresser and threw them in his bag.  He walked to the door and she watched him go.  

 

He paused, hand on the door.  He looked over his shoulder at her, not quite meeting her gaze.  “For what it’s worth,” he said.  “I love you.  And I’m sorry.”

 

END CHAPTER


	4. Chapter 4

**New York**

**February 1947**

 

“Peg, Peg, slow down,” Howard said.  “What the hell are you talking about?”

 

“He’s out there, Howard,” Peggy said into the receiver, knowing she sounded half mad.  Truthfully, she probably sounded the way Howard had last year when he was in Ivchenko's thrall.  “ _Steve_.”

 

There was a long pause and when he spoke again, his voice was much softer.  “I know, Peg,” he said.  “I know he’s out there.”

 

“No, Howard,” she snapped.  “You don’t understand.  He’s out there.  He’s alive.  He survived the crash.”

 

“ _ Peggy _ ,” Howard said quietly.  “It’s been two years.”

 

And she knew then.  She knew that if she pushed, everyone was just going to think she’d finally gone around the bend.  Or been compromised, as Howard had been.  They’d lock her up, write her off.  She slammed the receiver down, cradling her head in her hands as she cried again.

 

She didn’t indulge herself for long.  She wiped at her tears.  Aimless, she walked over to the dresser, staring down at the array of items.  There was Steve’s compass.  He’d forgotten it when he left.  When she kicked him out.

 

She picked it up, studying it.  She’d never really bothered to look at it.  Walking over to the bed, she sat down.  The compass was old, weathered.  She opened it.  The needle was rusted in place and the picture of her was brittle with age.  She hung her head again.  She touched it lightly, shaking her head with incredulity. 

 

He was telling the truth.  As insane as it was, Steve had been telling the truth.  Seventy years and he'd kept her with him the whole time.  Only to wake in a distant time, alone.

 

Had it really been there in front of her all along and she was just too blind to see?  He was undeniably Steve.  She knows he didn’t outright lie to her at any point.  That wasn’t his style.  But there were surely lies of omission, misunderstandings he chose not to correct.

 

If he was to be believed - and she did believe him - then the Steve Rogers she promised to take dancing was out there, freezing, lost.  

 

As for the other Steve - older, more battered, her lover.  She didn’t know where he was.  She desperately wanted to not care.  But she did.  She couldn’t help it.  But she didn’t want to see him.  She wasn’t sure she could face him, knowing he was robbing her of the chance to save the man she failed. 

 

* * *

 

Steve watched her, always from a distance.  She was still so angry, and so hurt.  It was his fault, for meddling where he had no business meddling.  He knew Peggy’s fate.  He knew enough of her history to know how her life was supposed to go.  And he knew it didn’t include him.  Not for decades.  And then, only a fleeting, fragile connection at the very end of her days.

 

Peggy Carter had an illustrious future ahead of her.  And he wasn’t part of it.  No more than his memory might have some influence, that much she’d told him herself.

 

He hurt her.  More, even, than his initial disappearance had hurt her.  He insinuated himself into her life and then twisted her trust for no reason other than that he didn’t want to live without her.  His own weakness and folly.  And now she was so raw and wounded.  All because of him.

 

* * *

 

The next time everyone at the office went out for drinks, several weeks later, Peggy went too.  She drank far too much, trying to drown her sorrow and regret.  She was lonely and angry.  When Jack offered to drive her home, she didn’t object.  She hoped Steve was watching - and it made him jealous.

 

Jack walked her to the door, leaned in for the kiss, but she turned away.  In another time, another place, maybe it would have been enough.  But she wasn’t that desperate or self-destructive.  Peggy knew what it meant to be with someone who truly loved her.  And without that, it was all depressing mechanics.  

 

Steve, as it turned out, wasn’t watching.  Or at least, he didn’t react in any way she was aware of.  For his part, Jack took the rejection better than she thought he might, with nothing more than a sour expression and a curt ‘Night, Marge’.  She hoped to God they could pretend it never happened.  Around the office, Jack was his usual abrasive self.  He gave her more pointed looks.  But he never brought it up and neither did she.  She thought maybe he could be adult about it, until everything happened with Dottie Underwood.  Jack’s pride was viciously stung by his inability to break Dottie, so he packed Peggy off to Los Angeles to help Daniel.

 

As irritated as Peggy was, she thought perhaps it could be just what she needed.  Lord knew she could use a change of scenery.  So she arrived in Los Angeles eager to see both Daniel and Howard, only to discover that Daniel was engaged and Howard was engaged in his typical repulsive behaviors.  At least she had Mr. Jarvis.  When he wasn’t busy with Howard’s menagerie.

 

With Daniel, there was still an undercurrent of regret, the pallor of missed opportunities.  Still, she wished nothing but happiness for him and Violet.  Peggy hoped that Violet could be the partner to Daniel that Peggy never would be.  Perhaps she could have loved him, if circumstances were different.  But they never would be different.  Peggy had not one, but two versions of Steve Rogers to contend with.  It hardly left room for anyone else.  

 

Not that she’d seen Steve.  She hadn’t.  Not even a hint of him as she went about her life.  Not since the evening she kicked him out.  She wondered if he was really gone, or if he was simply getting better at hiding.  She suspected it was the latter.  Steve was a creature of habit.

 

Mr. Jarvis, as always, was a good friend and eager accomplice.  His wife, Ana, was a delight.  Peggy was almost remorseful that Steve wasn’t around to see the garter belt holster.  She suspected he would have enjoyed it immensely.

 

Luckily for Peggy, there wasn’t a lot of time to sit around pondering Steve’s reactions.  The mission was as important and harrowing as any she had faced.  Zero matter was a truly chilling discovery and securing it was of the utmost importance.

 

The mission would have been lost before it was even under way if it weren’t for Jason Wilkes.  Jason was a good man, who wanted to make a difference.  He was willing to risk it all to do the right thing, and in the process, restored some of her faith in humanity.  Men like him were in short supply.  He was incredibly smart and attractive.  Surprisingly sweet and charming as well.  Peggy thought they made a good team.

 

And then Jason died.

 

Because of her.  

 

She failed Jason, just as she failed Michael and Steve.

 

* * *

 

Peggy bid Mr. Jarvis good night, closing the door.  She stood there, resting her forehead against the door, swamped with guilt and regret and sorrow.  She bit down on her lip to keep from crying.  It seemed that everything she touched these days was falling apart.

 

She heard the floorboards creak and she lifted her head.  She turned around, leaning back against the door, watching him cross the room toward her.  She didn’t know how he found her and she didn’t really care.  Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew she should be angry.  But mostly, she was happy to see him in one piece. 

 

Pushing off from the door, she closed the distance, wrapping her arms around his waist, burying her face against his chest.  He was still for a moment, but then closed his arms around her, holding her tight.  Steve pressed a hard kiss to her temple.  “You’re okay.”

 

She wasn’t sure if he was telling her, or himself.  She reached up, pulling his head down for a kiss that was sweet and slow.  “Make love to me,” she whispered against his lips, not caring if she sounded desperate or weak.

 

He nodded, kissing her again.  They moved to the bed and he undressed them both, slowly.  He touched her gently, like he was afraid she might shatter.  For her part, Peggy gave over to him.  She was still so angry with him.  But she felt wrung out, used up.  And she trusted him, perverse as it seemed.  She trusted him to take care of her, to know her almost better than she knew herself.

 

They lay together on the bed, naked, touching lightly, kissing.  Outside, the sun was cresting the horizon and she could hear the birds chirping.  In the gray light, he looked sad, weathered.  She cupped her palm against his cheek.  She loved him.  She did.  In spite of the anger, in spite of everything.  They belonged to each other in a way they could never belong to anybody else, and as much as she hated that, she couldn’t deny it.

 

He moved over her and she wrapped her legs around his waist, kissing him as he slid home.  Every movement was languid, soft.  He looked in her eyes as he kissed her before moving his lips to her ear, her jaw, down her neck.  She ran her hands over his shoulders, down his back.  The controlled strength in his body was at once exciting and humbling.  He was gentle for her, mindful of her myriad hurts.

 

As he rocked into her, his right hand was between their bodies, rubbing her intimately.  She could feel her climax approaching and she gripped him tighter, her breath coming short.  He didn’t attempt to tease or prolong.  He gave her exactly what she needed, where she needed it and she was hissing through her teeth, her fingernails biting into his shoulders as she came.

 

He slowed and started to withdraw, but she caught him, pulled him back, planted her heels in his backside and made it clear what she wanted.  He buried his face in the crook of her shoulder and neck, rocking his hips against hers before his body went taut and then relaxed.  

 

He rolled onto his side next to her, pulling her close.  She let him, because in that moment, she needed to be loved by him more than she needed anything.

 

* * *

 

There was a knock at the door and Peggy opened her eyes.  Bright morning light was streaming through the windows and Steve was nowhere to be seen.  She wasn’t shocked.  Pushing herself out of bed, Peggy shrugged into her dressing gown and opened the door, giving Ana Jarvis a sad smile.

 

END CHAPTER


	5. Chapter 5

**New York**

**June 1947**

  
  


“I accept,” Peggy said firmly, meeting General Phillips’ gaze.  She took a deep breath.  “But there’s a ... complication, you should know about.”

 

* * *

 

Howard showed up just as she was finishing packing up her small living room.  “You’re really going to leave New York behind?” he asked.

 

Peggy nodded.  “I’ll miss it.  I have a few things to wrap up here, but I should be in Washington by early next week.”

 

Howard nodded, looking at her speculatively.  “So, uh, Wilkes ... “

 

Peggy arched an eyebrow at him, but said nothing.

 

“I, uh,” Howard started, absently rubbing the back of his neck, “he, uh, relocating too?”

 

Peggy blinked at him.  “I have no idea.  But why would Dr. Wilkes be moving?  Didn’t he just accept a job with Stark Industries in Los Angeles?”

 

“Well, I thought,” Howard started awkwardly.  He motioned vaguely to her midsection, wincing.  “ _ No _ ?”

 

Peggy glared at him, stuck somewhere between being offended and confused.  “Dr. Wilkes was incorporeal for the vast bulk of the time we’ve known each other.”

 

Howard shrugged.  “It’s my understanding it doesn’t actually take that long.  Or so I’ve been led to believe. I don’t have any personal experience with being quick, or with, um ....”

 

“Go away, Howard,” she snapped, shooing him to the door.  “I will talk to you later.  I have work to do.”

 

“Sousa?” he asked, eyebrow arched.

 

“Now!”

 

Peggy slammed the door after him, sighing with exhaustion when he was gone.  The movers would be here the day after tomorrow and she wasn’t even halfway finished packing.  And she didn’t even have that many possessions.  Or so she thought.  Possessions seemed to be stacking up lately.

 

She sighed, slumping down onto the couch, pulling the scarf off her head.  She found more than a few of Steve’s things as she was packing.  She put them in a box, along with her own items.  Presumably he’d have use for them again.  Peggy was done pretending she’d locked Steve out of her life.  There was no point.

 

They weren’t back together, officially.  Of course, he wasn’t alive officially, so she took that with a grain of salt.  She hadn’t seen him since Los Angeles, but she knew he was around.  It would serve him right if he didn’t know she was moving.  Though she doubted it would take him long to find her again.

 

With a groan, Peggy pushed herself to her feet.  The SSR’s New York bureau was giving her a send off that evening and she needed to get ready.

 

* * *

 

“You ass,” Peggy snapped, hurling Jack’s jacket at his head.

 

Jack batted it out of the way, scowling at her.  He’d had way too much to drink and Peggy hadn’t had nearly enough.  “Jesus Christ, you’re a hellcat,” he cursed.  “I don’t even know why the hell I bother trying.”

 

“That makes two of us,” Peggy replied smartly.

 

Her relationships with Jack, both personal and professional, were in a downward spiral from which she doubted they could recover.  Typically, Jack wasn’t overly pushy.  She suspected his ego was far too delicate to risk outright rejection.  But he could never leave well enough alone.  Everyone in the New York office had taken her out to celebrate her success in Los Angeles, her promotion, and accompanying move.  Jack offered to see her home, and attempted to turn a friendly cup of coffee into considerably more intimate send off.

 

He made a pass at her and she showed him the door, in no uncertain terms.  “ _ Out _ ,” she said, aware that throwing people out of her apartment seemed to be a theme.  It was, undoubtedly, a side effect of the company she kept.

 

“Marge,” he barked, trying to forestall her as he clutched the coat to his chest.

 

“No,” she said, “get out.” It was late and she was not in the mood.  She pushed him out into the hall and grabbed the door, swinging it shut as she turned to head back inside.

 

He stuck the toe of his shoe in the door at the last minute and the door popped back open.

 

Peggy immediately turned, placing a hand against the door to shove it shut at exactly the same time Jack did the same outside, intending to push it open.  Peggy’s hand slipped and the door smacked her square in the face, splitting open her bottom lip and bloodying her nose.

 

“Oh, shit,” Jack cursed, immediately reaching for a handkerchief.  “Peggy, I didn’t mean - “

 

Holding the handkerchief to her face, she shoved him back outside and this time closed and locked the door.  Her nose and lip were throbbing and her eyes were watering.  She held the cloth to her face, turning her head as she heard a noise.

 

Steve was standing in the middle of her tiny living room, looking like he was ready to tear someone limb from limb.  Slowly, he approached her and gently grasped her jaw in his fingers.  She pulled the handkerchief away and he tilted her head up, frowning as he looked at her face.  She knew that despite the throbbing, it wasn’t bleeding that badly.  The slow trickle of blood down the back of her throat was fairly nauseating though.

 

Steve’s eyes lighted on the door and he started to move.  Peggy immediately grabbed his wrist, pulling him back to her.  He looked down at her, breathing hard, clearly furious.  

 

Slowly, she shook her head.  “I’m fine,” she said quietly.  “And you can’t.”

 

“He - “ Steve started darkly.

 

“If you beat the Chief of the SSR’s New York bureau to a pulp, there will be consequences,” she said.  “You’re always telling me how you can’t interfere.  This would be interference.”

 

Steve frowned, but finally nodded.  He stepped back and she released his hand.  He didn’t look happy.

 

“Peggy,” Jack called through the door, and Peggy could see Steve bristle.

 

“Go away before I call the police,” Peggy snapped.

 

“Peg, I’m sorry.”

 

“Go  _ away _ .”

 

Peggy turned, heading into the kitchen, filling a dishtowel with ice cubes.  Steve stood there, glaring at the door.  “He’ll leave,” she said flatly, “he’s nowhere near as stubborn as you.”

 

“He hurt you,” Steve growled.

 

“I had a slap fight with a drunk and accidentally got a split lip,” she said dryly.  “Apparently, you were watching.  You  _ know _ it was an accident.”  She gave him a sour look, despite how much it hurts her lip to frown.  “I am not in need of rescue.”

 

“I didn’t - “ he started, sheepish.

 

She waved him off, walking toward the bedroom.  The feel and taste of the blood dripping down the back of her throat was suddenly too much and she gagged.  Bolting for the bathroom, she managed to make it inside before she started retching violently.

 

She finally stopped and pillowed her head against the side of the cool porcelain tank.  She knew Steve was standing there, watching, probably fretting, but she didn’t look at him.  Of all the times for him to show up.

 

“I think we should take you to the hospital,” he said quietly.

 

She didn’t even bother opening her eyes.  “I’m not going to the hospital.  I didn’t go when I was impaled last month, I’m certainly not going for a bloody nose.”

 

He was quiet for a moment and she knew that he hadn’t known about her incident with the rebar.  “You could have a concussion,” he said.

 

“I don’t have a concussion, Steve,” she said flatly.  “I’m pregnant.”

 

She opened her eyes then and looked up at him.  He was staring down at her, expression slack.  He shifted his weight back and forth on his feet, opening and closing his mouth several times before he said, “Pregnant?”

 

She looked up at him.  “If you ask whose it is, I will kill you.”

 

He pursed his lips together and he looked sheepish.  “I wasn’t going to ask.”

 

“Good,” she said.  “Now go away and give me some privacy.”

 

He stepped out of the doorway, pulling the door shut as he went.  Peggy sighed.  This wasn’t precisely how she had intended to tell him he was going to be a father.  But nothing in their relationship had ever gone to plan.

 

Slowly, she pushed herself to her feet.  She studied her reflection in the mirror.  She looked absolutely dreadful, cheeks splotchy, nose and lip swollen, eyes watering.  Deciding there was little that could be done for it, she brushed her teeth, mindful of her injured lip.

 

* * *

 

Steve was waiting when she finally exited the bathroom.  He handed her the forgotten ice pack.  She took it from him, pressing it gingerly to her face.

 

“Are you okay?” he asked quietly.

 

“Stellar,” she replied dryly.

 

On her way to the bedroom, she closed the window to the fire escape without comment.  He wasn’t proud that he’d been out there watching her, but in light of how the evening had gone, it seemed like maybe it wasn’t such a terrible thing.  In the bedroom, she turned on the lamp and sat heavily on the bed, dishtowel of ice cubes pressed to her lip. 

 

Steve stood in the doorway, leaning against the doorjamb, arms crossed over his chest.  She looked up at him, eyes narrowed.  They hadn’t seen each other since that early morning in Howard’s guest room in Los Angeles.  That had to be the encounter that led to the pregnancy.  It wasn’t like there were any other opportunities.  

 

Steve had no idea what to think.  Peggy was pregnant.  With his child.  It was -   He didn’t even have a term for it.  Outside the realm of possibilities.  He knew how her life was supposed to go.  And he knew, unequivocally, that it did not involve having a child with him.  But the timing was right.  And if she was pregnant now, it was his baby.  He looked at her, with her split lip and swollen nose, trying to bite back the rage he felt at the fact that she had been hurt.

 

“Care to tell me what that scene was about out there?” Steve asked.

 

“Not particularly,” she said.  She looked up at him, narrowing her eyes.  She sighed, seeming to relent.  “My former boss made a pass at me, so I kicked him out.”  She watched him, clearly waiting to see how he would react.

 

“Former boss?” was all he said.

 

“Yes,” she replied evenly.  “I’ve been promoted.  The SSR is starting a new division.  I’ve been tapped to lead it.”  

 

Steve already knew this was going to happen, but it still made him so nervous.  Especially now.  He looked at her and then away.  Finally, he met her gaze.  “And how does ...” he motioned to her vaguely.  “How does your current situation affect that?”

 

“Ah,” she said tightly.  “My current situation.  The euphemisms begin already.  And from my accomplice, even.”

 

He frowned at her.  “How does the fact that we’re going to have a child together affect your new job?”

 

“Well,” she said, arching an eyebrow.  “One would assume that field work will have to be put on hold for a while.  Unless I intend to impersonate a whale.”

 

“ _ Peggy _ ,” he said, the warning clear in his voice.

 

She looked at him, pursing her lips together and then sighed.  “Truthfully, I have no idea,” she said.  “I told Phillips.  He grumbled and waved his hand, but didn’t rescind the promotion.  Presumably he told Howard, since he was over here earlier today trying to discover the identity of the father.”

 

“Did you tell him?” Steve asked.

 

“I told him to piss off.  It’s none of his business.”

 

He nodded.  “So what are we going to do about this?”

 

She stared at him.  “What  _ we _ ,” she motioned to herself, “are going to do about this is that  _ we _ are moving to Washington D.C.  The day after tomorrow.  If you want to help with that, you can stack boxes in the living room.”

 

He took a step into the room, looking down at her.  “I’m serious, Peggy.”

 

“So am I.  They’re heavy.”  She looked up at him and then sighed.

 

Steve closed the distance between them, taking a seat on the bed next to her.  He draped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her against his side.  

 

She slumped against him, still holding her icepack.  “Are you upset?”

 

“I, uh, no,” he said, taken off guard.  “ _ No _ .”

 

She looked up at him.  “What?”

 

He shook his head.  “Just ... surprised,” he said.  He looked down at her and gave her another squeeze.  “You?”

 

She shrugged.  “I suspect we’ll get by.  It’s less than ideal, but most things are.”

 

“And when you say  _ we _ ?” he asked, looking at her.

 

“I want you to be part of this, Steve,” she said quietly.  “I’ve always wanted that.”

 

He was so intensely grateful for her words.  But he knew they had a long way to go.  “You were really angry,” he said carefully.

 

“I’m still really angry,” she said, looking up at him.  “But I’m resigned.  And I’ve discovered I have no desire to be without you.  Especially now.”

 

“Well, that’s mutual,” he said.  He leaned down and pressed a soft kiss to her forehead.  He pulled back and looked around the apartment.  “I suppose I probably need to help you pack, huh?”

 

“If you wouldn’t mind, Captain.”

 

* * *

 

It was very late when Peggy woke.  Her hand was splayed across Steve’s abdomen, so she knew he was lying on his back.  Given that he wasn’t snoring, she knew he was awake.  “Are you okay?” she asked.  The room was completely dark and it was impossible to see his face.

 

“Yeah,” he said quietly, but there was something in his tone.

 

She rolled over, pressing herself against his side.  His arm immediately went around her, holding her close.  “What’s going on?” she asked.

 

“I, uh,” he fell silent.  She heard him sigh.  “Like I said earlier, I’m just surprised.”

 

She lay there for a moment, but when he didn’t say anything more, she pressed, “What are you really thinking about?”

 

“Given my unique perspective,” he said, unable to completely hide the bitterness, “I’m not shocked by much.  Definitely not by the big things.  And this ... surprised me.”

 

Peggy considered his words.  “So, in your history, this didn’t hap- “

 

“That’s not it,” he said quickly.

 

“What, then?” she asked.

 

“I ... met them,” he finally said.

 

In the darkness, Peggy frowned.  What was he talking about?  “Met who?”

 

“Your children,” he said quietly.

 

Peggy tried to imagine that, Steve, in the future, yet younger than he was now, meeting her children, who had to have been significantly older than him.  

 

But if they were her children, then they were also  _ his _ children.  And he hadn’t known.  He’d met his own children and been unaware of the connection.

 

But, by the same token, if he’d met her children, then that meant that after he arrived in 1943, he chose to have a relationship with her, knowing that she would eventually have a family.  A family he assumed he wasn’t part of.  

 

She could see why he’d tried to keep his distance.  But perhaps now he could see why it was ultimately futile.

 

She swallowed against the bite of tears.  “Where did you meet them?”

 

He was quiet for so long she didn’t think he was going to answer.  When he spoke, it was in a near whisper.  “At your funeral.”

 

The depth of anguish in his words tore at her heart and she hugged him tightly.  She wondered if this is what he felt when she raged at him about her Steve, lost in the ice.  The Peggy he lost was her, and yet Peggy couldn’t help the stab of jealousy at the thought of him mourning her so profoundly.

 

“We’re here together now,” she said.

 

“Yes,” he said firmly, holding her close.  “We are.”

  
  
  


END CHAPTER


	6. Chapter 6

**Washington D.C.**

**December 1947**

 

Peggy gripped Steve’s arm tightly, taking careful steps across the icy sidewalk.  Even being as careful as she was, she was still waddling.  She felt ridiculous and uncomfortable, her body obstinately uncooperative.  Her sense of balance was abysmal lately, so Steve had taken to escorting her to and from work when the weather was icy.  It was less than ideal.

 

Peggy’s promotion alone would have been enough to manage all by itself.  But she found herself not only pregnant and unwed, but pregnant with a dead man’s child.  It was immediately obvious that something had to be done.

 

Officially, Steve was now John Steven “Steve” Ross, an identity Peggy had painstakingly cobbled together.  Like Steve, Mr. Ross had no family, no one to miss him.  His military record was clean, but nothing to attract attention.  Steve’s few concessions to altering his appearance were his beard and shorter hair.  Being older naturally changed his appearance somewhat.  He carried himself differently now and Peggy knew there were few who might suspect his true identity.

 

Mostly, Steve tried to stay out of sight.  So having to escort his heavily pregnant wife to and from work wasn’t great.  Peggy assured him that she could manage, but she’d seen that look.  She knew there was no arguing with him.  So she settled for moving as fast as she could, trying to minimize the amount of time he spent so close to SHIELD operatives.  Steve hated the organization’s name, which was part of why she fought so hard for it.

 

“It’s a bit overwrought, don’t you think?” he’d asked dryly.  Though, presumably, he already knew that’s what the organization was going to be named.

 

“I’m mourning a national treasure,” she said, not bothering to look up from her book as she took a bite of a biscuit.  

 

“You’re pregnant with some Ross guy’s kid.”

 

“Still mourning,” she replied, unfazed.  “It’s a tribute to Captain Rogers’ heroism and sacrifice.  My devotion to his memory doesn’t end with my marriage to another man.”  Especially since he was actually the same man.

 

He’d made an irritated noise, but let it drop.

 

They had married in the summer, before she’d started showing.  Peggy kept her name, given that neither of them were particularly fond of the idea of being Rosses.  Peggy had tried to get Steve’s input into creating the identity, but he refused, deferring to her.  When she had handed it over to him, he didn’t seem shocked by the name.

 

As the neared the last section of stairs before the parking lot, Steve’s good hand came to rest at her waist.  She started to slip, but he immediately compensated, steadying her.  When they finally climbed into the car, she sighed in relief.

 

She dozed as Steve drove them home.  It was a different kind of exhaustion than what she’d felt early in her pregnancy, but it was still exhaustion.  At least when she dozed in the car, the baby dozed too, lulled by the motion.  When she tried to sleep in bed, the baby invariably picked that time to practice contortions.  It was supremely unnerving to be woken up by another person who was inside your own body.

 

* * *

 

Later that evening, Peggy was folding tiny little outfits, freshly laundered, and putting them away in the bureau in the nursery.  Steve came to stand in the doorway, watching her.  She glanced at him.  “You know, it would be easier to prepare if you would just tell me if we’re having a girl or a boy.”

 

He shook his head.  They’d been over this a thousand times.  Steve knew her history.  But neither of them could be certain that the history he remembered was in fact her future.  And if he’d learned anything, it was that he knew so much without knowing a thing.  The name, Ross.  That was the name of Peggy’s husband.  Which, as it turned out, was him.

 

So Steve knew that her first child, a son, was born shortly after she started SHIELD.  But he still wasn’t sure.  And he didn’t want to tempt fate any more than he already did by simply existing here.  There was no danger in waiting to find out if it was a girl or a boy.

 

* * *

 

Peggy was curled on her side in bed, watching Steve as he read.  He was still so handsome, even moreso now.  Because now he was all hers.  She wondered if domestic life was going to drive him mad.  Not that he had complained.  But she expected him to go stir crazy.  To her shock, he hadn’t.  

 

Steve managed to keep himself busy.  Busy, but available.  It was a delicate balance.  He did freelance work, artistic commissions.  It paid well and he enjoyed it.  He’d also made a series of highly lucrative business investments - abetted, she suspected, by his knowledge of the future.  So he wasn’t a kept man.  But he could also go days without needing to leave the house, and often did.

 

When she got home at the end of the day, he was always there waiting.  She enjoyed that immensely, but she wondered if he felt short changed.  She wondered if he felt like he was living another man’s life.

 

He glanced over at her and arched an eyebrow.  “Yes?”

 

“Are you happy?” she asked.

 

She expected a wiseass answer, but he just looked at her for a while.  Finally, he set the book aside and scooted down on the bed, lying face to face next to her.  “I’m better than happy.”

 

She frowned at him.  “What does that mean?”

 

He was quiet, reaching out and tucking a lock of hair behind her ear.  “I’m ... settled,” he said.  “I didn’t think I’d ever have that.  Anywhere.  I feel like I finally belong somewhere.  Here.  With you.”

 

She took his hand and threaded her fingers through his.  “You never talk about your past.”

 

He shrugged, looking away.  “My past is a double edged sword.”

 

“Because you believe it’s my future.”

 

He nodded slowly.  “Yeah.”

 

She looked at their hands, pressed together.  “But not all of your past is about me,” she said evenly.  “You had other people, other ... lovers.”

 

He frowned, his expression shuttering.

 

“I’m not prying out of some misguided jealousy,” she told him.  “I simply want to know that not every second of your life after the Valkyrie was horrible.  I want to think that you found some kindness.”

 

He looked at her, not seeming entirely convinced, but he gave her a tight smile.  “The acclimation, after they defrosted me, took a long time,” he said quietly.  “Everything I knew was gone, different.  The world changed  _ so much _ .”  He sighed.  “But I made allies.  Eventually.  That took time too.”  He frowned.  “I found a way to make a difference, a way to improve people’s lives, even if I couldn’t improve my own.  I found bits of comfort here and there.”

 

She reached out with her free hand, cupping his cheek.  “Did you love them?” she asked.  She wasn’t sure why she asked.  She didn’t want to think of Steve with other lovers.  She didn’t want to think of him being in love with them.

 

He looked at her, holding her gaze.  “You were always - ”  He stopped, pursing his lips together.  

 

“I was always what?” she asked.

 

He looked at her and a little frown puckered his brow.  “You were always the one, Peggy.”  He sighed.  “They were friends.  I cared for them.  But they were very compartmentalized relationships.  You were always my best girl.  Always the one I loved.  I have never said those words to anyone else.” 

 

* * *

 

“Steve,” she said, shaking his shoulder.  “Wake up.”

 

He grumbled, shoving his head farther into the pillow.  “‘s Saturday.”

 

“Steve.  It’s time.”

 

* * *

 

Howard’s eyebrows were nearly at his hairline when Peggy opened the door.  “Shouldn’t you be in bed?” he asked, hurrying inside, shutting the door behind him, against the blowing snow.

 

“I had a baby, Howard,” she replied evenly.  “I’m not dying.  The office is couriering over files twice a day, so I’m not exactly on vacation either.”

 

He still looked wary as he removed his coat and hung it in the closet.  “Gotta say I was surprised when you invited me over.  I was beginning to think that you didn’t ever want me to meet that husband of yours.”

 

Peggy arched an eyebrow.  “Oh, you can meet him,” she said.  “It should prove entertaining for me, if nothing else.”

 

True to the time of year, the weather outside was indeed frightful.  Blowing snow had shut down most of the city and Peggy was surprised Howard hadn’t taken the opportunity to cancel.  She knew babies weren’t really his style.  It was testament to how curious he was about her personal life.

 

“You two sure didn’t waste in any time starting a family,” Howard said, looking around the inside of her house like he was expecting it to be booby trapped.  

 

“I’m not sure that’s how I would classify it,” Peggy said.  She led him into the den, “Howard, this is my husband, Steve.”

 

Steve was standing near the floor to ceiling windows that looked out over the picturesque backyard which was currently washed in mounds of white.  His back was to the room and he had the baby asleep on his shoulder.

 

Howard approached, hand held out, and Steve turned to face him.  Howard stopped in his tracks, gaping.  

 

“Howard,” Steve said by way of greeting.

 

Still gaping, Howard looked from Steve to Peggy.

 

She smiled at him.  “Have a seat, Howard.  I’ll make you a cup of tea, heavy on the bourbon.  We need to catch up.”

 

* * *

 

Steve walked through the darkened house, rubbing small circles against the tiny back.  The baby was finally asleep.  Evenings tended to be a little rough.  They were his grouchy time of day.  But he settled fairly quickly once Steve started walking around the house.

 

Steve pressed a gentle kiss to the top of his son’s head.  Michael.  They named him after Peggy’s brother.  Steve had known, of course, that the baby would be a boy, that they would name him Michael.  But again, it struck him as odd that he could know so many facts without knowing a thing.

 

None of the information he possessed meant anything when compared to reality of Steve cradling his tiny boy to his chest.  His son.  His flesh and blood.  Steve would do anything to keep Michael and Peggy safe.  

 

Steve still didn’t know if this is how it was supposed to go.  Was he always Peggy’s husband?  He truly had no idea.  And the harder he thought about it, the more his head hurt.  He knew that he had to let the worry go, and live his life.  He couldn’t wonder, every step, if he was causing some future disaster.  He had a wife and a son who needed him to be present and accounted for.

 

Carefully, Steve laid Michael in his bassinet.  He stood there for several minutes, with his palm spanning his boy’s chest, waiting to make sure that he was really out.  When he was certain, he crept out of the nursery and into the master bedroom.

 

He looked over at Peggy as he pulled his shirt over his head.  “I thought you were going to warn Howard.” 

 

“Why on earth would I have warned him?” Peggy asked, incredulous, flipping through a magazine in bed.  “That would have taken the fun out of it.”

 

“It wasn’t very nice,” Steve said.  “He was shocked.”

 

“We were all shocked, darling.  It’s no reason not to find some amusement in it.  Especially when it’s shock that you’re alive, rather than the alternative.”

 

Steve shook his head, joining her under the covers.

 

“Did Michael go down easy?” Peggy asked.

 

“He did,” Steve said.  “He had a big day.”

 

“Indeed,” Peggy agreed sagely.  “Eating, pooping and sleeping.  It’s exhausting.”

 

Steve scooted closer to her and pressed a soft kiss to the hollow beneath her ear.  She made a happy noise and pulled him close, resting her head against his.  “I love you, Steve,” she whispered.

 

“I love you too.”

 

END CHAPTER


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The interview Peggy gives is based on this:
> 
> <http://eatingcroutons.tumblr.com/post/138855141640/peggy-carters-1951-1953-interview-part-of-which>

**Washington D.C.**

**March 1953**

 

“Yes,” Peggy said, “but why do  _ you _ have to bring the card table and folding chairs?”

 

Steve shrugged.  “I don’t know.  That’s what I got.  Everyone has to bring something.”

 

Peggy rested her hip against the kitchen counter, folding her arms over her chest as she stared at her husband.  “And let me guess, Carol is the one who made all of these assignments.”

 

“Well,” he said sheepishly, “yeah.  She’s hosting.”

 

“Of course she is,” Peggy said sourly.  She tucked her hair behind her ear in frustration.  This haircut was abysmal.  She’d made the mistake, after James was born, of chopping it all off.  It seemed easier, with a toddler and a newborn.  And the results had been horrific.  She’d been trying to grow it out since, but it still looked awful.

 

And her overall feeling of unattractiveness wasn’t helped by the fact that last month, they learned they were going to be welcoming another bundle of joy.  They were going to be outnumbered.  Peggy tried not to dwell on that.  Her clothes were already too tight across the chest, leading her to have to dress in some decidedly unflattering clothes.  The navy blue suit was perfectly serviceable.  And it buttoned across the chest, which was of vital importance.  But it was frumpy and did little to flatter her figure.  It looked matronly, especially when combined with her hair.  And right now, the last thing Peggy wanted was to look matronly.  Especially when they were discussing Carol and her demands on Steve.

 

Homelife in the Carter household was a delicate balancing act.  Peggy worked very long hours.  Her job was demanding and vitally important.  Steve was incredibly supportive.  He never made her feel guilty for her commitment to her work.  But since he was home all day with the children, they shared an obvious bond that made Peggy somewhat jealous.  Steve took over most of the traditionally female roles, including getting together with the neighborhood housewives so the children could all socialize.

 

Carol, from three doors down, was the local ringleader.  She organized most of the neighborhood get togethers.  And Peggy hadn’t missed the fact that Carol very much enjoyed Steve’s company.  Not that Peggy had any worries about Steve’s commitment to her.  But she wasn’t about to put anything past Carol.

 

Steve was taking the kids over to Carol’s house for the morning to give Peggy space.  She spent most of yesterday with an interviewer to catalog the history of the SSR and SHIELD.  Phillips put her up to it, so she couldn’t very well decline.  There was a final session this morning and then she could get back to business as usual.

 

At that moment, Michael burst through the door, with his younger brother, James, in close pursuit.  Michael was very much his father’s son.  Tall and towheaded with bright blue eyes and a sweet temperament.  James, by contrast, was built like a truck, short and squat with dark hair and eyes and a will more stubborn than both of his parents combined.

 

“He’s touching my stuff!” Michael bellowed.  James grabbed the truck, which Michael was attempting to hold out of his reach, pulling on it as hard as he could.  Michael was two years older and a good head taller, but James was determined, and had no qualms about fighting dirty.

 

“Fellas! Fellas!” Steve said, scooping one boy under each arm.  He looked from Michael over to James, shaking his head incredulously.  “What are you two doing?  We talked about this.”  James started howling and Michael kicked his legs, trying to squirm out of Steve’s grip.  

 

“I want to go now,” Michael demanded.

 

“In a bit,” Steve said.  “We’re spending some time with your mother.  It’s not often we get her home during the day like this.  It’s a treat.”

 

James howled louder and Michael burst into tears.  Peggy ground her teeth together, determined not to start crying.  Pregnancy hormones, surely.  Though even for the typical chaos of the Carter household, this morning’s display was a bit out of bounds.

 

“Hey, hold still,” Steve said, looking at James, frowning.  He set Michael down on the floor and Michael took the opportunity to dissolve into a puddle, sobbing forlornly.  Steve held James tucked against him with his left arm and used his right hand to grasp the little boy’s head, turning it to the side.

 

“What is it?” Peggy asked, crossing the kitchen, stepping over Michael.

 

Steve showed her the mark.  “Does that look like?”

 

Peggy released a beleaguered sigh.  “Chicken pox,” she said wearily.  She crouched down and examined Michael.  His stomach was covered with little red dots and he was too warm.

 

* * *

 

By the time the interviewer arrived, escorted by Peggy’s personal secretary, Peggy and Steve had managed to get both of the boys down for naps.  But Peggy was frazzled.  She and Steve had both had chicken pox, so there was no danger to them, or to the baby, but Peggy knew it was going to be a long several weeks as the illness ran its course.  And she didn’t like the idea of Steve and the boys being in the house while the interview was being conducted, though there didn’t seem to be much she could do about it at this point.

 

There wasn’t anything in the interviews that Steve didn’t already know.  But knowing was one thing.  Being asked questions about certain events, certain battles and judgment calls, having to explain one’s self, was another matter entirely.

 

Peggy was upstairs with Steve, while the interviewer and cameraman set up in the living room.  Peggy adjusted her hair and makeup, dissatisfied with both.  She looked over at Steve, who stood in the hallway, peering down the stairs.

 

“You have to stay out of sight,” she said, frowning at him.

 

He gave her an impertinent smile.  “I know the rules, boss.”

 

She cocked her head to the side, giving him her best withering glare.  It didn’t seem to have much effect as he crossed the room and pressed a kiss to her frown. 

 

“I know,” he said quietly.  “I’ll be good.”

 

Still frowning, Peggy exited the bedroom and walked down the stairs, greeting the interviewer.  It took them several minutes to get the lighting and the microphones adjusted, pouring herself a cup of tea, and then they were under way.

 

* * *

 

As she had known, the topic for the day focused on Steve Rogers and his history with Project Rebirth and the SSR.  Peggy suspected that this portion of the interviews would be used for some commemorative event.  They were three months from the ten year anniversary of when Steve Rogers became Captain America, at least from a publicity standpoint.  It would be several months more before the anniversary of when he had truly proved himself for the first time.  Peggy thought fleetingly of that harrowing flight with Howard over enemy airspace, the look of determination on Steve’s face.  Forcing a smile, she tucked those thoughts away.  

 

The first few questions were general inquiries, rehashing of information to which the interviewer, no doubt, already had access.  But Peggy played along gamely.  Trying to maintain a delicate balance of being appropriately respectful, but also light.  It surprised her how difficult it was to discuss Dr. Erskine, and his role in Project Rebirth.  He had been a man of such vital importance and insight, taken all too soon.

 

They discussed the serum itself, and Howard’s contributions to the project.  Peggy spoke highly of him and completely omitted any of the more colorful stories she had concerning Howard.  Suffice it to say, the mystique of Howard Stark, had been thoroughly obliterated for her.  But she was polite and complementary and professional.

 

Then the interviewer moved on to the intended plans for Project Rebirth, touching on the fact that Steve had been intended to be the first of many super soldiers.  Choosing not to dwell on what could have been, Peggy reminded the interviewer that Steve had turned the tide of many a battle all on his own, and without any accompanying fanfare.

 

“Did Captain America have an affect on you personally?” the interviewer asked.

 

Peggy blinked at him, thrown by the question.  For several moments, she couldn’t reply.  It took all of her efforts to keep her face impassive.  “I beg your pardon?”

 

“I’m sorry,” the interviewer said quickly.  “I just mean it must have been a remarkable experience getting to work with him.”

 

Again, Peggy was thrown.  She thought of that meeting, after Steve’s disastrous USO performance in Italy.  Of how defeated he seemed, until he discovered that Bucky was in trouble.  And then, the absolute determination on his features.  And she couldn’t think of that without thinking of how many times she’d seen that same expression echoed in James’s features.

 

She took a deep breath, regrouping.  She couldn’t allow herself to entertain these thoughts, certainly not now.  So she gave the interviewer a response about the importance of professionalism and detachment.  Though that line of thought led right back to how unorthodox her relationship had been with him.  

 

“Steve,” she said, hating herself for slipping and using his first name, “never let me forget that these were real lives and deaths that we were dealing with.”  She paused, thinking of all the ways Steve hadn’t been a typical soldier, or a typical man, in her experience.  “He also treated me like a person,” she said, “which I very much appreciated.”

 

“I recently spoke to several soldiers who credited Captain America with saving their lives,” the interviewer said.

 

Peggy was momentarily glad for the reprieve and she smiled.  “Well, there are a lot of men who could give you that interview.”

 

“This was outside Volgograd,” the interviewer continued.  “In 1945.”

 

Peggy schooled her features into a mask as impassive as she could manage.  Jesus.  She took a deep breath and a drink of tea, giving herself time.  “Yes,” she finally said, setting down the teacup, “that was a difficult winter.  We were in Russia.”  

 

Peggy was swamped with memories.  It had been so bloody cold.  She remembered a reconnaissance mission.  Short.  Perfunctory.  But freezing.  It was a blizzard, the worst she’d ever witnessed.  She had been truly afraid that she was going to end up with frostbite on her fingers.  All of the Howlies had been there, but much to her dismay, they seemed less affected by the weather.  It was early in the morning when they were heading back to camp.  The Howlies made themselves scarce, in as polite a way as they could manage.  

 

Time alone with Steve had been so rare.  He didn’t talk, he just took her hands, which were aching from the cold.  He loosened the front of his uniform and tucked her hands inside, against his skin, holding them there.  She was fairly well wrapped around him at that point and he circled her with his arm, ducking his head so she could press her cold nose against his neck.

 

When they finally pulled away, her hands were much warmer and her heart was full.  She had loved him so much that day.  But she’d never told him.  Never even acknowledged what that act of kindness meant to her.

 

And on that same day, somewhere behind the German line, the other Steve, her lover, her husband, had been freezing.  Alone and hurting.  Starving.  Lost and confused.  Believing he was damned to a life of observation, doomed to die alone, within sight of the people he loved.

 

“A blizzard had trapped half our battalion behind the German line,” she said tightly.  “Steve - Captain Rogers,” she corrected.  “He fought his way through a Hydra blockade that had pinned our allies down for months.”  She took a breath.  “He saved over a thousand men.”  She smiled then.  “Including the man who would become my husband, as it turned out. Even after he died, Steve was still changing my life.”

 

The interviewer nodded and then winced, like he was afraid to ask the next question.  “I understand that you were the last person to speak to Captain Rogers before his plane went down.”

 

Peggy felt her eyes prick with tears.  She smiled tightly, holding onto her composure by a thread.  She nodded.  “I w-was, yeah,” she managed.

 

“Could you tell us what he said?” the interviewer asked.

 

Peggy felt her chin wobble and she fought, she fought so hard to keep it together.  She opened her mouth to speak, but there were no words.  There was no way she could tell this man what Steve had said.  And even if she had been capable of speaking, those were  _ her _ words.   _ Their _ words.  They were private and sacred and she owed them to nobody.  In eight years, she had never told another soul what was said and she wasn’t going to start now.

 

Frowning, she managed a strangled, “I’m sorry,” before she put down her cup and headed upstairs.  Peggy heard her secretary talking to the interviewer, informing him that she was feeling unwell.

 

Peggy walked up the stairs in a haze, blindly going into the bedroom.  To do what, she wasn’t sure.  But she never had to decide.  Steve was there and he gathered her into his arms.  She wrapped herself around him, sobbing, and he held her.  

 

A long while later, he pulled back and kissed her gently.  She cupped his face in her hands, pressing her forehead to his.  

 

“It’s okay, Peggy,” he said.  “We got our dance.”

 

She pulled back and looked at him, frowning.  

 

Steve smiled.  “Look around,” he said.  “Every day.  Every day is a dance.  With the right partner.”

 

END STORY


End file.
